Daily Record from Morristown, New Jersey • Page 1

There's Something About A Battlefield see tgif Weichert Realtors vjest SEE OUR AD ON PAGES 18 19 'aper That CaresC 20 CENTS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1978 TED. rolbe Iinito Planne Craslhi ComUiiniinies i an i i 1 Investigators Say Victims Were Sophisticated Pilots' rf r-, Hk i 1 Inspectors also discovered a "blind hood" device used for shielding a pilot's view of the horizon, forcing him to rely on instrumentation for landing approaches. Discovery of the blind hood bolstered investigators' belief the pilots had been on a training flight although it was not Cop Sensed Trouble, Page 11 known if either pilot was wearing the device at the time of the crash. Safair Vice President Ted Hebert said the pilots may have been practicing landing approaches without the use of outside reference points. He said a low lying fog may also have contributed to the accident.

Visibility was estimated by FAA officials to have been about two miles in the foggy haze at the time of the accident. Herbert also said the plane should have been safely flying at 1,000 feet when it struck the 250,000 volt Jersey Central Power and Light cable and 117-foot tall power tower. Although the plane's landing gear was protracted at the time of the collision, investigators were uncertain if the pilots were attempting to land at nearby Mor-ristown Airport or if the gear had malfunctioned. Officials said a typical landing pattern for Morristown Airport would be about 1,000 feet in the air. The craft was also flying in a westerly direction away from the airport at the time of the crash, although officials said he may have been beginning a broad holding pattern for a landing.

Hebert said normally the landing gear automatically extends when the craft's air speed falls below 100 miles per hour. If this was the case, Hebert said the plane was flying well below its maximum air speed of between 165-170 miles per hour. Frank Gardner, air worthiness inspector for the FAA, said preliminary investigation of the wreckage of the craft indicated the plane's engines had not stalled but were running when the craft struck the tower and the cable. Gardner also said one of the propellers on the year-old $60,000 Piper Arrow was about four inches shorter than the other; prop and was ensnarled with a section of the power cable. Mum's The Word By PHIL GARBER and LAURIE PETERSEN PARSIPPANY Two New York City men were apparently involved in a training flight in their single-engine plane 900 feet below safe altitude and at 65 miles per hour slower than the craft's maximum air speed prior to yesterday's fatal crash on Mountain Way, officials said yesterday.

Officials from the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board continued the investigation today of the crash which claimed the lives of the men, tentatively identified as Dr. John J. Timmermans, 42, and Hollis M. Cheverie, both of New York City. Positive identifications were not available pending completion of autopsies performed by the Morris County Medical Examiner's Office.

Police said the bodies were burned beyond recognition in the crash although credentials identifying Timmermans were found on one of the bodies. According to Vernon Taylor, chief of the New York field office of the National Transportation Safety Board, both victims were "sophisticated pilots." The FAA said Timmermans was a licensed flight instructor and received his pilot's license more than 20 years ago. Cheverie was licensed in 1969, the FAA said. According to a log book, the pilots had rented the plane about 8 p.m. from Sa-fair Flying Service, Inc.

at Teterboro Airport. Safair flight instructor Al Hornstra said Timmermans had flown from the airport often. A wing of the aircraft was located below a power tower, with a passenger door discovered some 1,000 feet away at the point of impact. A luggage compartment door was discovered some 50 feet away from the charred impact point and the remainder of the plane 50 feet further down the hill. Investigators also located the plane's emergency locator transmitter.

The device is used to signal a downed craft's location, although it failed to function upon the plane's impact, according to a National Transportation Safety Board official. Scattered in the twisted mass of metal, was not competent to live on her own. State mental health officials do not know how many other former patients are now suffering the same plight as did Miss DeGroat. She was twice committed to Greystone and was released last month by court order. When she left, she had $5 and no place to go.

She spent the first night after her release in Morristown Police Headquarters whose community services division had tried to assist her after her first release in 1977. Subsequently, she was charged with harrassing police and was placed in the Morris County Jail. She was released just last Friday. In a hearing before she was sent to jail, she told the court that she would "hustle" to make her way if no one would help her. i 1 V.

Clare's Hospital for advice after the inci dent at the service station. A doctor at St. Clare's told them that if she was not a danger to herself or others, she could be taken home. Police took her back to the motel, but at 1: 15 a.m. she was back at police headquarters, complaining she wanted to go back to Morris-town.

Since no one could be reached, police took her back to the motel and told her to call her social worker in the morning. They also told her she was free to leave if she wanted. Everything was quiet when they left, police said. Miss DeGroat, mental health workers said, was a patient who defeated the system. She was not considered psychotic and could not be kept in Greystone against her will.

At the same time, she Ptw Byron Photo Mrs. Lillie Steurer of Mount Tabor is up to her neck in Chrysanthemums. And why not? The New Jersey State Chrysanthemum society will be holding its 25th annual show, tomorrow (2:30 to 8 p.m.) and Sunday (1 to 5 p.m.) in Drew University's Baldwin gymnasium. Former Greystone Patient O.B.9 Killed Would-Be Flagpoler Files $250,000 Suit By Auto Hospital officials said that they had pleaded with the woman, whose last' known address was Paterson, to stay voluntarily in the hospital until some plans could be made for her future. They also suggested that she enter the hospital's home care program, in which patients live in the community homes but remain under hospital supervision.

She refused, they said, to either stay or to consider any programs that were under hospital supervision. "She never wanted any kind of restraint," one hospital official said. Lakshmi Bulusu, director of social services for the hospital, said Parsippany police called her Wednesday night and asked her to come and get Miss DeGroat. Since Miss DeGroat was discharged by court order, she said, she could not do that. bor Day.

The indoor "suite" was to be equipped with a lounge chair, lights, television, radio and a phone on which the would-be record breaker could receive calls from boardwalk strollers or anyone else. He forwarded personnel information at Gerrard's request, he says, and was notified May 14 he was one of three finalists. Two days later, Lazar says, Adie indicated he had the job. He met Gerrard in Wildwood May 24 and was told he had been selected and publicity releases to that effect already had been mailed out. One story on his being hired is attached to the suit.

Lazar says he heard nothing further and sent a mailgram June 2 advising he was ready to begin. He says Gerrard called him three days later to say a con-stuction problem had developed and the promotion might be delayed four weeks. That was the last he heard. The suit also alleges that World Atlantic and Adie's were enhanced and unjustly enriched by the publicity about La-zar's stated goal to break the flagpole sitting record. workers tried to find her permanent housing.

In the 12 hours preceding the accident, she had been in Parsippany police headquarters twice. She was picked up Wednesday afternoon at the Village Exxon Station where she was begging patrons for money and early Thursday morning she showed up at headquarters with a complaint. Only hours after police returned her to the motel, the accident occurred. Police said she was struck at 3:47 a.m. by a car operated by Edward Ross, 36, 80 Yacht Club Road, Lake Hopatcong.

Ross said she just appeared on the roadway. She was taken to St. Clare's Hospital, Denville Township, where she died shortly after 6 a.m. Parsippany police said they had called county social services, Greystone and St. r- a tit 1 i.

I GAME THREE You're On, Ron Ron Guidry gets the nod tonight and the Yankees' World Series hopes rest squarely on his dimunitive frame and explosive left arm. The Yanks trail the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2-0, in the fall classic and no team has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit. In fact only five have ever come back from a 2-0 disadvantage. T.J. Simers has more on Page 28.

By PEGGY CARROLL PARSIPPANY O.D. is dead. The former Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital patient, who had promised she would "hustle" in the streets if she could not find help, was killed yesterday morning when she was struck by a car as she walked along Route 46. Ollie DeGroat, 29, identified as "O.D." in news stories about her plight, was a patient mental health workers said "fell between the cracks" in the state's mental health system. She had been in and out of Greystone and jailed for but continued to resist the efforts of various agencies attempting to help her.

Since the weekend, she had been lodging temporarily at the Garden Motor Lodge on Route 46 while mental health fVI Weather Today Light Showers Tonight Light Showers Tomorrow Partly Cloudy, Mild See Page 1 1 Today Today Is Friday, Oct. 13, the 286th day of 1978. There are 79 days left in the year. Ann Landers 9 Business 6 Classified 12-24 Comics. 33 Crossword Puzzle 33 Editorial 4 Horoscope 33 Lottery 11 Obituaries 2 Sports 28-32 Television TGIF Theater Weather 11 VOL.

79' NO. 94 A 4, t' jrfei By LORETTA BOECHE A 21-year-old Denville man who wanted to break the world's flagpole sitting record has filed a $250,000 lawsuit against promoters he says reneged on hiring him to perform the stint at the Jersey shore. Joel Lazar, a physical fitness addict and karate student, says he relied on the representations of New York promoters that he had been selected from 750 applicants for the $10,000 three-month marathon and quit his landscaping job in Morris Township. Lazar says he has been subjected to scorn and ridicule and his reputation damaged because the promotion in Wild-wood was shelved after the company received widespread publicity about its plan and the hiring of Lazar. The suit, filed by Samuel DeAngelis, is against World Atlantic Productions New York, and its division, Adie's Fantastic Facts 'N Feats, Wildwood, and two employees, Norman Adie and Jerry Ger-rard, also known as Jerry Commarato.

Lazar says he called Gerrard in April after seeing a Daily Record story about Adie's search for someone to man a six-foot platform from Memorial Day to La.